Colcannon
40 min · 6 g protein · 187 cals / serving
Ireland's buttery, comforting mash, swirled through with tender savoy cabbage, kale and spring onions that have been gently warmed in milk. Fluffy potato, soft green ribbons and a little golden pool of butter melting in the middle. A heap of greens in every forkful, made for sausages, ham, salmon or a Sunday roast.
Ingredients
- 2 lb gold potatoes, Yukon Gold or a floury potato, peeled, in chunks
- 1/2 medium head savoy cabbage, cored and finely shredded
- 5–6 cups loosely packed kale, stems removed, finely shredded
- 2 tsp butter
- 6 green onions, thinly sliced
- scant 1 cup 1% milk
- 1 tsp salt, plus more for the water
- 1/4 tsp white pepper
- a grating nutmeg
- 1 tbsp butter, to finish
Steps
- Boil the potatoes in salted water for 15–20 minutes, until completely soft. Drain and leave them in the pan off the heat for 2 minutes to steam dry.
- Meanwhile, melt the 2 tsp butter in a large frying pan over medium heat, add the cabbage and kale with a splash of water and cook, stirring, 5–6 minutes, until tender and bright green.
- Warm the milk with the spring onions in a small pan until steaming, then turn off the heat and leave them to soften.
- Mash the potatoes until smooth, then beat in the hot milk and spring onions, the salt, white pepper and nutmeg. Fold in the greens.
- Pile into a warm dish, make a well in the top and drop in the last tablespoon of butter to melt into a little golden pool. Serve hot.
Good to know
Cabbage or kale?
Both are traditional, and using both gives you the soft sweetness of savoy and the deeper green of kale. Use all cabbage or all kale if that is what you have; keep the total weight the same.
Why the butter on top rather than in the mash?
It is the Irish way to serve it, and it puts the butter where you taste it first. Each spoonful drags through the melted pool, so a tablespoon tastes like far more than a tablespoon beaten in.
Leftovers?
Shape cold colcannon into patties and pan-fry them in a nonstick pan with a spray of oil until crusty on both sides. Excellent with a fried egg.
Alternatives
Per
- Calories
- 67
- Protein
- (14%)
- 2 g
- Fat
- (22%)
- 2 g
- Carbohydrates
- (64%)
- 12 g
- of which sugar
- 2 g
- Fiber
- 2 g
- Sodium
- 166 mg
More side dishes
Computed from the ingredients with our published formula, not yet kitchen-tested. How
As written, 1124 kcal goes into the pot and 1783 g of ingredients comes out as about 1680 g of food: 67 kcal per 100 g. Cooking moves water and energy density is the score's biggest lever, so the dish is scored as cooked, not as an average of its parts. Every ingredient links to its food page, with the same data and score. The label's percentages are each macronutrient's share of the calories. The full formula.